In 1999 I jagged a late inclusion in a 50th Anniversary of UNSW Cricket game at the Village Green. Henry (Geoff Lawson) had been given some budget to run the day and had teed up some Test player mates to play (I replaced Mark Taylor at late notice, who had suddenly landed some Australian of the Year duties!). In my team was the one and only Merv. I remember seeing a quote sometime from a Test player that said it all………..”the great thing about Merv Hughes is that he’s more like Merv Hughes than Merv Hughes is”. And so he was – zero pretence, great company and funny all day. One thing I remember about the stars playing is that they were all putting in and, on reflection, having been at the level they had, I guess they just don’t do it any other way. It really helped make it as memorable a day as you could hope for.

Anyway, Livo (Greg Livingstone) , skipper of the “Academics”, decided that I should bowl some of my leggies. Mercifully, my first over wasn’t embarrassing, even though I was bowling to Neil Maxwell, who certainly looked to only know one way to play, having bowled with some fire earlier and now looking like taking us apart. I was expecting to go for about 20 an over. At the end of the first one, Merv came up to me and said something like “Hey, I used to play with Maxie for Victoria and I know how to get him out. Just bowl another over like that, make sure you throw them up, I’ll set your field and I’ll sledge him”.

Next over, Merv set a deep square, a deep cover and put himself at a very straight deep mid-off, halfway back. Neil settled into his stance and then pulled away, showing a bit of exasperation and asking “What’s this?” – pointing at Merv, who was waving his arms behind the bowler (me). Merv called out: “Hey Maxi, where are you going to get any runs? We’ve cut off both of your shots!” Maxi told him to get away from behind the bowler and settled back into his stance. I threw it up – it landed and turned a bit (it was August and there was zero grass out there – refer pic) and Neil came down the wicket to, I think, hit me onto the UNSW Walkway. He didn’t get hold of it and it ballooned – to Merv! He took it, and amongst the uproar, I ran over to celebrate with him where he met me with “Mate, cricket doesn’t get any better than that!”